Great Artisan Cheeses of the South | The Cheese Professor

Editor’s note: Contributor and cheesemonger David Phillips CCP has been sharing his appreciation for the cheese and cheesemakers of the South. This week we conclude the series with a closer look at how some noteworthy cheeses are being made in the region.

Rocket's Robiola photo courtesy Boxcarr Handmade Cheese

Austin Genke works with his wife and his sister making Italian-style cheeses, with a specialty in the Robiola style--a sumptuous, wrinkly rind cheese that oozes fat and flavor. Some of their award-winning cheeses are made from the milk of their own goats, while others are made with cow’s milk or a blend of the two, reflecting the mixed-milk tradition of the Lombardi originals. Their Robiolas are made using authentic Italian starter cultures acquired through a friendship that started at an American goat farm. Boxcarr Handmade Cheese, is not in Vermont or in Wisconsin, but in North Carolina, a state known more for wind-swept beaches and smoky barbecue than for its cheesemaking. Asked if he ever wishes he were in one of those more dairy-intensive states, Genke is quick to answer no.

Cheese in North Carolina

“I think we are strategically placed,” Genke says. “We sell at just one farmers’ market here, but we get great support from the university (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill) and from the community.” And yet, even he may be surprised by the path he has found. “I never thought I would be moving to North Carolina,” he adds.

Genke and his sister Samantha grew up in the ‘80s and ‘90s “surrounded by grapefruit” in Vero Beach, Fla. By 2009, having completed culinary school in Olympia, Washington, Austin was working with famous chefs in Las Vegas. It was there and then, that he fell in love with Italian cheeses, and with his future wife, Dani Copeland. Meanwhile Samantha, who is now the primary cheesemaker, was learning about farming and cheesemaking at two successful North Carolina farms.

Making Cheese at Boxcarr Farm

Their mutual intersecting interests led to the 2011 acquisition of what would become Boxcarr Farm. The name came in part from the address (on Carr Store Road), from memories of a favorite children’s book series, and from the use of shipping crates on the farm. The “kids” as their father Paul calls them, were barely 30 then, and they ran a food truck while planning for the creamery. Cheesemaking began in 2015, and the cheeses they produced were quick to gain attention for their outstanding quality, their uniqueness (few American artisans are so focused on Robiola-style cheese), and their beautiful appearance and packaging.

Boxcarr cheese production photo courtesy Boxcarr Handmade Cheese

Seasonal goat cheeses include Cottonseed, Doeling, Cottonbud, which are all bloomy rinds, Robiolas, and Redbud and Nimble, which are pressed, aged cheeses. Cow’s milk and blended milk cheeses include Rocket’s Robiola, Cottonbell, Campo, Lissome and Rosie’s Robiola, most made year-round. A line of fresh spreadable cheese called Freshen includes flavors like Chive, Herb and Garlic and, yes, Pimento. By late January, heart-shaped Cottonbell Hearts will be ready to ship to retailers for Valentine’s Day. Boxcarr recently received a state grant that will allow it to add equipment and expand cheese production. Paul Genke, who has had a long career in the citrus business, helps with sales and marketing.

Boxcarr goats photo courtesy of Boxcarr Handmade Cheese

Finding Local Support

Austin says the local southern cheese community has played a role in the company’s success. “Everybody we have met has offered a piece of information that has been influential,” He says. He notes that there are three cheese artisans within an hour’s drive of Cedar Grove and three more that are about two hours away. For about two years now Boxcarr has managed its own herd of goats (an expansion from 75 to about 120 milking does is planned for this year) while it continues to buy Jersey cow milk from neighboring Lutheridge Jersey Farm.

Meadow Creek family and cows photo courtesy Meadow Creek Dairy

Meadow Creek Dairy

Among those who have inspired Boxcarr, are the folks at Meadow Creek Dairy in Galax, VA. Meadow Creek’s cheesemaking journey is rooted in the 1988 launch of a family-operated farm and dairy operation. Cheese followed several years later, after Helen and Rick Feete had fine-tuned their dairy, with their herd of Jersey-mix cows producing consistently outstanding milk. Cheeses like Grayson and Appalachian won numerous awards and have become mainstays in top-notch cheese shops from coast to coast. In recent years, Helen and Rick’s daughter Kat has joined the business, as has her brother Jim, and their spouses. Meadow Creek practices intensive rotational grazing, which provides ideal nutrition for the cows and healthful regeneration for pastures and soil, and the overall farm environment. While the farm is located in the mountains, with a short, but sometimes eventful winter, Meadow Creek cows are typically in pasture from March or early April until early December. Cheeses are only made while the cows are on grass, which is part of the reason they are so good.

“We are in a different situation than much of the South,” Kat Feete says. “Our summers are sometimes cooler than Wisconsin and Minnesota, and we do get some ice and snow in winter.”

Feete is encouraged to see new cheesemakers arriving on the scene in the Southern states. She says that her family’s operation has received visits from the folks at Boxcarr and those from Sequatchie Cove Creamery in Tennessee. She loves the cheeses that the newer neighbors are producing. “Some of them are making the kinds of cheeses we don’t make, so it’s a treat to get them when we can,” she says.

Meadow Creek is also in growth mode, having recently established a second farm and expanded its cheesemaking and aging facilities. A new cheese, Galax, added late last year, is a washed curd that’s a bit like a Gouda. Grayson is a soft, washed-rind cheese, a bit like Taleggio, and was inspired by Helen and Rick’s vacation discovery of the Irish gem, Durrus. Appalachian is a pressed, aged Alpine style.

Meadow Creek's Galax photo courtesy Meadow Creek Dairy

More Southern Cheesemakers

Recently Food & Wine Magazine listed (without ranking) its Top 50 US cheesemakers. Included among them were Sweet Grass Dairy of Georgia, Boxcarr, Meadow Creek, Alabama’s Belle Chevre, and Working Cows Dairy, as well as two from Tennessee--Sequatchie Cove Creamery and Blackberry Farm. Many of these cheesemakers of note are members of the Southern Cheese Guild. The guild’s site links users to 16 different Southern cheese companies.

A Cheesemonger Weighs In

Personal observations, here: The cheeses from Sequatchie Cove and Boxcarr, are relative newcomers at Potash Markets where I work in Chicago, and customers have taken to them very nicely since we began to introduce them three years and year ago, respectively.

Alas, there are too many makers and cheeses, and shops for me to list all of them here, but I wanted to point out a few of my favorites. Please leave comments and accept apologies concerning those not mentioned.